Brand Your Creative Business

Lesson 19 of 22

Your Branding in Print Materials & Online

Brand Your Creative Business

Lesson 19 of 22

Your Branding in Print Materials & Online

Lesson Info

Your Branding in Print Materials & Online

The next area where you can think about applying your brand elements to our your promotional materials and we actually talked about kind of some of these things as we're talking about packaging because they really start to overlap but your promotional materials would also be things like postcards business cards a catalogue your line sheet and obviously we're not we can't get in the line sheets here but if you check out my other class on selling your products to retailers we spent a lot of time talking about line sheets and catalogues so you have those kind of promotional materials and you want to go through that same checklist so do your promotional materials reflect your brands visual style guide so you know my promotional materials are always gonna use thes kind of same conventions so white background or dark gray background logo fought all of that's gonna apply three promotional materials as well and then how can you incorporate more of your brand stories into things like catalogs a...

nd other printed materials so this might be a case monaco where maybe your box is really simple and classic but there's a catalogue that you're sending out that tells mohr that mom lifestyle story this is a really good example of this s paseo texas there a brand or s posse austin their brand it's all these handcrafted leather goods and they're telling a huge visual story just by this they don't even have to tell you like this brand is for x y z. We know it right from those pictures, right? So using those great model shots using those great lifestyle shots and the beauty of something like this is you, this is from their catalog, but you know either of those two images on the right, they could be great postcard images, too, especially that bond. One where you see the bracelets that's, a great postcard image. If she wanted to, she could stick a little logo on there, and it would be really great. Um, you know, the other thing that I always think is a good idea if you're doing a postcard is you're putting your product on, but put your business name or your logo on the front side of the post card, too. Oh, postcards get hung up on the wall, and they might not ever look at the back so the front should give you image of the product and a logo or a name if you're sending out a postcard and you could also think about what unexpected promotional materials you can use to connect customers to your brand. So for some reason, I forgot to bring them up here, even though I actually worked on getting them done before I came, but I just had thank you cards made because I wanted to have a branded thankyou card that I could send out so I used that same kind of background that he used in my logo that uh kind of dark painted background but just the text thank you over it and then the backside of the you know the backside of the card really little where you'd have the mark of whoever made it is my logo and and that's it so now any time I want to send a thank you card to a store to a customer's whoever I've got one that's branded so what other unexpected go ahead do your question yeah about what you were saying with your tags yet it blank on the inside um safe we were goingto certainly something for this would you recommend not putting than your business card in there if I was just going to put a description just leave it but I would probably just print the other side with your I want it a business card or something else right cause that starts to feel messy those things like jumble around in there so yeah I put it all on kind of one one piece okay, thank you but yes so you know are there other things that you can use? Can you do stationery? Thank you cards whatever it is that makes sense for your brand in terms of your promotional materials you guys have any other questions about promotional materials unexpected promotional buy like the thank you cards or things that you don't normally think of as a promotion but printed collateral that still fits with your brand so in your case maybe it's um s so you could do something like ah card that you share if you see a woman who may be it seems like she's having a rough time of life and the car just something like I've been there too a kindness card right? You know things like that or any help you could do it for the moms right? So like the mom is struggling with the diaper bag and you're like, hey, I've been there too and it's just the little card that just says that and then the brand I use and I can't take credit for this idea but I have cards that I can hand out that just say thanks for the compliment and then there was a little discount code on the web site so someone comes up and they're like hey like your jewelry there have to be like thanks I made it you know because that always feels a little uncomfortable right? Here's the card and I give those two people to like I give those actually sister uses thumb probably more than I do she's always wearing my product and she said when I give people that card they're like oh my gosh thank you so much like they're excited to then get the card so all of those kind of little things can help build your brand and any time you could make them share a ble like we talked about don't send one sticker sent to you know, maybe if you make those like I've been their cards there's a couple that go out with every package so that if they want to share the kind of cards if they want to share and spread the word they can do that so things that make it really easy for your customers to help you with that word of mouth marketing or what about like on the move cards you can put different like quotes like exactly so you could have multiple quotes yeah and sent out whatever you wanted yet little inspirational bits there's a lot of things that you could dio I always think that the promotional materials that's like a chance to have fun all right you can play around you could do some interesting things and and kind of spread the love is a great way to think about it you know, thinking about taking we talked about like the manifesto or the vision statement or the love letter that's something that you can print up I have the manifesto printed on cards and I put that out into orders and things like that so all of you he's kind of brand elements that we've been talking about can be applied to your promotional materials anything online these people are really resonating with this they're saying how much they appreciate when they received a hand written note the product and they're saying that the value of that is so important says people saying they often send thank you cards out on the ice and they get really good feedback on that absolutely so yeah people say they're really loving the idea is that you're sharing great yeah and I think that's a little moment of even if all the note is just thank you and your name in your handwriting that you've taken the time to write that's a big deal to people it shows that there's a little bit of personal attention coming in order and that can really help in dear people to your brand for sure all right, so let's talk about applying your brand elements to your web presence and we started to talk a little bit about this is we were looking at her studio audience websites we're gonna look at them a little bit more in a minute um but your web presence includes things like your website, your online shop, your blawg and these may or may not be the same site right? So for some of you they might be all one place that hosts a website, a shop, a blawg some of you might have more than one of these things so when I say web presence or website? I'm talking about anyplace on the web that you have kind of own the space so let's, talk about the branding elephant in the room if someone is using someone else's service negatively impacting your brand. So this is something that I want everybody to kind of think about as you're moving forward with your branding, if you're using somebody else's online platform, is that giving you the best opportunity to really put your brand forward? So whether that's someone else's branded shop or well, I know we have a couple people still using block spot as a blogged right that's, something that limits you, right? Because you're on someone else's platform you mentioned, I can only use a couple different fonts because I'm on block spot, so when you're using somebody else's platform, it actually negates ah lot of the brand building work that you've done. So yes, you could put in a banner and yes, you can put in your image and yes, you can plug in your products, but you don't have control over that space. What you want, if you're going to do the work to do the branding, is to use a space where you have total control, yes, you might still use somebody else's template, but you can make that completely your own. So that means that you're going to want to stick to things if you're if you're in the d I y mode and you're not hiring a web developer to do the entire thing for you, you're going to use things like a self hosted wordpress sight, so that means a wordpress site that you install at your own domain. You can use a service like shopify or big cartel for a web shop, but again, you want to direct them to your own domain because that's, the next thing is you all your girls belong to you if you're trying to own your brand, you want people to go to things that are your name dot com not your name dot something else dot com and it's okay, if you use sub domains so you can see when you're on my shop, it's shopped out mega dharma dot com that's okay, you're in my shop that still makes sense, but that's my domain, I own it. I am not sending tio you know meg anon and dot shopify dot com, which is an option with a platform like that, but I'm not I'm redirecting to my girl the's air really subtle things, but they make a big difference in terms of perception we talked in the very first segment about how branding can make you seem more professional than you feel something like that, you know, making sure the girl is just you and not with someone else that's a little thing that makes a big difference in the way that people perceive your brand and it's all easy to do it's very simple domain fording switch and if you're not even super tech savvy, call up your your internet service provider call of the person who owns your domain name your web host and I guarantee you they will walk you through it those customer service guys are just waiting for you to call they will help you I do it all the time I don't have to do something with my website I call my web post super easy they'll walk you through sarah you your shop if eyes you're hooked is your don't even so this is this shop is built on shopify okay, but somehow you you don't have sharp if I up in the right shot both shopify and big cartel which are there to great online platforms, they let you do what's called domaine forwarding so instead of having to type in the whole shopify thing it's your name and then it actually all the links or just your name you never see shopify except for at the bottom of the page where it says powered by and it's a very easy fix in your back end yeah and then we want to make sure that our website is reflecting the overall mood and style of our brand right? So we want to make sure that we're using our logo our fonts and our color palette to create a consistent web presence and it's okay if you have to jump between two websites and they're not identical but we want to make sure that they feel similar so the easiest way for me to show you guys this is just to show you so if were on my main website so I know this is a question that's going to come up so I'll just explain it my main website which is loading slowly is built on wordpress it's a self hosted wordpress site and I did this for a lot of complicated reasons but mostly because I did it a long time ago and so I have that and then I have my shop which is separate so they're not identical in terms of design and layout right? But they have the same vibe so you're here and then if you click over my online shop it's not identical but it doesn't feel like I've gone to a completely different space right so it's okay to have these multiple places as long as you own the girl and it still feels like it's all part of your brand right so then thinking about things like are you communicating your brands key emotions and your purpose across lots of pages of your website so we talked about this idea that people aren't going to always come in through the front door so if you only have your mission statement or your vision or your tag line on the front page not everyone's going to see it so is there a way to infuse that into your product descriptions into your blawg posts into all those different ways or people are going to enter your sight and then thinking about the stories that you're going to tell on your about paige are you gonna tell your origin story hopefully going tell your origin story but you might also highlight customer stories as well and then making sure that your product descriptions help your customers envision your products is part of their story so product descriptions need to be customer focused its not I made this piece using x y z technique it's about how they're going to love wearing the piece as a way to help them through this personal transformation right now that doesn't mean that you can't give a few little details it's important that it's made of sterling silver for sure because that changes the value right if it was a cheap metal that would be something different and it's important that it's handmade so you can still talk about something like that it's not important not to say that's not important to you but it's not important your customer that it's so a piercing and a very specific pat nation technique the fact that it's handmade sterling silver that's what's important to them again because that we want to make sure that we're using language that makes sense and not things that feel like gibberish to them but we want to make sure that they feel like they can infuse their story and then and we're actually gonna look at all their websites again in a minute, so we'll we'll answer some of these questions, but you guys can definitely follow along in the workbook on and make sure that you're paying attention to your site and answering these questions for yourself. So how can you feature those customer stories across your website those visual and verbal ones? Can you post them on the block? Can you do a page that showcases the instagram hashtag like maybe monica you guys could create hashtag that's like you got this mom or something like that and so you want people to share then using the diaper clutch or using any of your products on instagram with that hashtag you got this mom or whatever you guys decide that's going to be and then you show those on the website so now you're encouraging people to share and it's a half shy that's also more interesting to than just the brand mate it's like it's a boost right? Like you got this mom so thinking about things like this, I don't know why I just decided everyone should use you got were all supporting everybody everybody's got this, um and the same thing with your block post how can you use your blawg posts to help your customers envision your brand as part of their story? So this is a great place to still put some content were in this sort of interesting shift where ah lot of brand stories I think our moving to instagram because it's a really great instantaneous place to share but your blogged conceal the really valuable because that's content that is very easily shared on pinterest. So a lot of times with this when we're talking about things like block posts and sharing customer stories, a two part strategy where you're putting someone instagram and some on your vlog is definitely the way to go because people are engaging in those different formats in different ways and then the same thing where you could be posting them on facebook and we'll get to social media in a second on but making sure that you're sharing those customer stories somewhere. Go ahead sir, give me a question forming along the block the whole blood thing is sometimes a little overwhelming to me um do you have to have a block, huh? Well, so they're a couple things let's actually switch over to my computer again uh and we are going teo answer that question and a couple others while we take a look we're going to start with we're gonna start with you sir so I know that you have this blood well who thatyou're not loving and not doing a wailing no so the the first answer is no technically do you need a block now but if you have a clear strategy for how it supports your brand it's really going to help you? Secondly if you're using pinterest is a marketing strategy than actually yes you do need a blogged ok it's really helpful so what I would say in terms of your blogged is that you want to come up with a strategy that makes sense for supporting the brand and the easiest way to do that is to use it as a place to share customer stories because the customer stories take the pressure off of you to generate content right so if you decide you and here you can see also to that you've got this content that's not very customer focused right? Is it so I'm preaching to the choir exactly it's something I feel I particularly seed a lot in the jewelry community you know it's great that you want to share and it's it's really great but it's not bringing in your customer it's bringing in your peers and at the end of the day your peers know by your jewelry right so you could decide that you were going to do something where once a week I'm going to share a story of a woman who went through some kind of incredible transformation in her life doesn't matter if she owns your jewelry or not. It's not the point. You're just trying to highlight these women, and this is something that you could actually hire someone to dio fairly inexpensively they you know, you brainstorm women that you want to reach out to, they send them an email, they answer maybe three questions they might be something like, you know where what were you doing before what? What sparked your need for change? What are you doing now? They might be better than that, but I want the top of my head. You know something really simple based on the story back, the person that's working for you and this isn't doesn't have to be employee could be someone that you hire online a virtual assistant they added the content they post the image up every wednesday. Whatever day you want I picked wednesday cause that's hump day people need a boost on hump day, right? Everyone's day that store a snooze story goes up and then people know this is a place to come. And then now it's not going to go up here we're gonna get weird get ready your bloodshot log yeah I'm going isn't it built into shop yes you're going to get just actually use your shop if I block on your news site so it's all going to be branded to your site and they're going to come and so they're going to see these stories but now they're all going to be introduced to your brandt so I know you're building um kind of a new a new site so what's gonna be different about that then kind of this old site that you've had before walk me through a little bit of what you're thinking in terms of the design elements and how you're going to apply your new branding so yeah like I was I was saying earlier I want the I I have a template that I actually already bought on top of fight I want the image there to be a big image across horizontal talked about that about like the color palette and things what do you thinking well what we were talking about earlier all the kind of you know smokey and brown and red and I'm envisioning the model you know it's a very beautiful shot a model wearing maybe a couple necklaces I've got I haven't made it yet a cough or two in a ring and earrings and so there's a little collection on her and how she's posing I don't know exactly but it's what are you thinking that like the website itself the background is light or dark or dark those those colors those nice great jacqueline ebrown smokey and with highlights of red and about where the green ghost but and it might be one of those things too so the other thing to keep in mind when you're thinking about applying your brand elements is that how much of every color you want to put in so you know you might want it to be dark but I know your temple is going to be a lot different than that but you know white tax in a dark background is hard to read so might be something where you decide that the outer border is that nice kind of dark smoky gray right and then the inner is it is a different, more readable color that text can live on so it's you know it's not short truce then but it might be like a really pale warm gray like all almost and the tope not not quite tope but almost so that could go in there so that just makes your website a little bit more user friendly but it's still applying the brand colors on and then you khun bring maybe that dark smoky color back in because you're using it as the background for the photography so that makes that photography pot more too and then again, as we talked about before you've got, then those pops of red that are going to show up so much more on your site when they're not on that red background already good, the dark I'm not sure you've mentioned before, I think in the last class about too much dark color, like being using a lot of ink, you know? So obviously I'm going to have to change that, so that right? So for something like your online sheet or your catalog that's going to be different, but for your website, it doesn't matter that you use the dark, it only matters and that you probably want to steer away from the dark anywhere where you have a block of text because it's not readable. S o that's, where you would apply like the dark border, you know, with maybe a lighter kind of interior body, but it's okay, you don't have to worry about that kind of dark color rule on the website on lian, a printed catalog and on ly if you think that buyers are going to be printing catalogs on their home computer, if you're printing a catalogue our line sheet, you're getting it professionally printed. Whether the background is whiter, rather, the background is dark or colorful, they're going to charge you the same price if it's a full color print it was only really if you think buyers or printing and what I'm actually finding is less and less buyers are actually gonna print that off so it's probably even less of an issue there awesome are we get anything from our line it's interesting that people were saying beach members specifically although a lot of people talk about the colors they're saying I think of transformational colors is being very light um so they found that these colors were a little bit dark for the messaging behind the product but they say they still use grays and greens but perhaps not just so dark is thes these almost sort of burgundy colors so maybe let a little bit of the lighter color coming through okay? Kathy let's take a look that you're so now we look to your website but you have a couple of different domain's happening here right thiss one existed before right? And it has a little bit more of like mommy stuff and so I remember you saying carbon from one like you felt like you had a following here so you don't want to lose this completely yeah, well street or what do you thinking that you want to keep this probably content you want you want to keep it right? Yeah, I see that a lot of people are being I mean still visited for certain things like there was a uh posting I did about what you should pack for the hospital and you're about teo sure, yeah, people still visit so I didn't wantto lose that but at the same time I felt like starting completely over just because what I want to talk about was going to be less yeah, so this website here what is this built on that's on the go daddy they had like uh okay, that did so shop my recommendation for you is that I would probably re build your main website using self hosted wordpress uh because what you can actually dio is you khun take then your old blog's spot blogged and you can import that toward press so I actually, um I started on block spot as well and when I created um when I moved when I made the switch and you at some point I knew blocks that wasn't serving me anymore. I actually was able to import all of my content, so if you go onto my block there's content all the way back two november of two thousand six and for those first I think three years that was blood spot content. So now that's all brought over and you're probably not going to get the same formatting um, you can see like the pictures are tiny and so it's not gonna be ideal, but if you could bring that content over and depending on who you're working with you're well web developer you may even be able to forward specific links for blawg spot I didn't work that hard teo move post links over but if you have post that you really care about you may want to try to bring those over. The other thing is if you have a post that's getting a lot of traffic on that old blawg thank you much newer post about packing for the hospital I would go back and edit that old post look let's pretend it's this post you know it's not but I would go back and edit this so right here it would say before you get to the content please visit us at our new home okay and try to get them to click over right so that way you can take advantage of that that stuff but you want to bring them to the new space okay? I had a quick question if I was going to leave say I was going to do that or just say I didn't transfer this information to if I want to shop here and they have their own blogged right and they do yes then if I was going to leave this block which is called living my style on its own it's living myself dot com and people still go to that is it do you not recommend me linking back then to my glimmer of gold from that site then just leave it as is and just don't link back so it's not really associate id here's here's that concerns so you are now thinking at this point that that you you want to keep creating content on this block right you don't wanna give us create content and general now I just want to but I don't want to lose so you don't want to lose this but at the same time having glimmer of gold and living my style I know that's confusing because now you're managing multiple brands so whatever you decide whether you decide to stay glimmer of gold or whether you decide that you're going to use your name I know your sort of debating on the hood but everything should be together so having a different blogger that's living my style even if you move it to living my style dot com that's still confusing to people will you because now it's like am I cathy from glimmer of gold or am I cathy from living my style and what do you tell people right so whatever you are be that all the time there's enough here that this to me doesn't feel off brand it's not like I look at this website and I think this is something that's completely different in fact when I clicked over to your blog's from your site for the first time I thought why is it a different name uh but I don't think that it was from a different person I got the overall vibe made sense I just couldn't understand why it was a different name, so I think pull it all together under the same name, whether it's, you're going to start using the shopify blogger or we can talk about cem cem strategy whatever makes sense the most for you, but but bring that over here and put it all under one umbrella and that's going to build a stronger brand for sure okay, we get anything from online? Yes, that is. The question came in said specifically about what you're doing here, kathy guess they say that the black and the gold is very, very strong, but also we talked about creams but there's a lot of white in the back there, do you think megan, a different color as the background would help those pop? What do you think the white is? Probably? I mean, I actually I like what's happening here. What do you have a little bit of a subtle texture? So I think you know, you wouldn't want to carry it through well, whatever you're doing, and I think what you're doing here is so actually what's interesting about this subtle texture is then the white pops more and then the black still pops, so actually think that I think you're getting rid of this gray right the great doesn't work as much for you what? Uh sixty more of the black and white the blood and then the golden like the little pit of some other color too yeah, I think that's a great great question though so I mean there's nothing wrong with the using a white background if it supports your brand but I agree I think that's nice just a little bit of texture makes a difference for you and I'm not gonna transition the block because right now it's just forwarding it you know when I click on log that warranted a block spot so I can't change the domain name teo represent even if I change that banner toe glimmering gold it would still be a different domain name and then it would confuse people wait to be all under the same umbrella so there's a few logistical things that you'll have to figure out you know yeah but ultimately at the end of the day whether it's glimmer of gold or whether it's your name the blogging the shop should all be under one domain it might be a sub domain so might be you know blawg dot climber of gold dot commer shopped at glimmer of gold dot com but it shouldn't be something completely different and then it blocks but you know it's like a totally different ending flog spot it's very confusing to people yeah, yeah, I didn't even know yours. We're on different ones. Good is that if the branding holds together, even use multiple platforms and most people have no idea. Yeah, so that's really what we're going for here, and I think you actually are, you know, other than kind of this navigation bar, you're close to being there with the branding again, this isn't feel off it's, just the name that so confusing. And then I think the other thing that you are gonna want to think about is that I know that you're running ads. Yeah, that was because it was from a while ago, right? You should be I want this to go to your shop, not somebody else's shop. Yeah, you're trying to tell you, like, actually, but, you know that work now that shop now, but if you go to your shop and not whatever advertiser, because you're going to make more money selling your own product than you ever will selling advertising anyway, and then I have one quick question. So if I was going to start over, say, I wantto just start a new block, like continue it with just glimmer of gold, is that weird then that I would just have maybe one? I mean, I'd have to build my postings, but is that going to kind of turn customers you think away that when they click on block there's like maybe just one now because I just I started I wouldn't start completely over what I would maybe do is pick the ten best posts from this old blawg and we post them o god and what you can say is you know this post originally appeared you could say this posed originally appeared a living myself but you don't even have to because it's your content yeah you don't have to attribute yourself right so just take your best post take the world and I would take those ones if you know they get a lot of traffic take um yeah because you couldn't use that post about packing for the hospital because you're origin story is about how you were inspired to create when you had your daughter right and so I know that you were saying like this is kind of like there's a lot of moms stuff happening on here but even though you don't want to overwhelm it being a mom is part of your story because that's what started it so it's okay if there's a little mom stuff on there and that's going to bring people into you anyway so pick those best posts could bring them over so the you've atleast got some good and it might be more than ten if there's like twenty great posts on here take them all take all the ones that are good customer focused other people are going to be interested in them content and put those on your new block that's great thank you sure so I know clearly you've got a lot of changing that you're working on um but I think for you guys you're not you're not blogging at all right? Where are you? Where do I find that if you click on the home page which I don't know where the home tab went that's okay, I could just put on your logo um and then if you were to scroll down right there up a little that's complicated so you shouldn't have to get someone a road map to find pia content just kind of keep that in mind uh the other thing that I noticed right away when we click over here is that when I'm on that main page of your block there's no images you have to click on an individual post right after the images that's an honest answer she didn't how teo like better format that because my blog's is all through word presses one parasite and I have ah fussed with the I don't I don't think that's something that I would just talk to ah webb find someone who knows wordpress and say this is what I'm trying to dio and truthfully you guys are gonna be recreating from the ground up anyway right? And I would probably stay with your website since you're going to go through this entire redevelopment process is figure out what is the best platform for you. So if you're really focuses on e commerce instead of doing your news site on wordpress, you might be better off just building it on shopify and using their blogging feature if you're goingto not blawg very often you're just going to use it as an occasional piece if you're really committed to blogging and content creation, it's still better to be on wordpress, but if you know that you're only going to be doing the occasional blogging like I think in your case and this is not true for everybody, but I think in your case based on your target audience you're better off doing more content creation on instagram then you are in a blogged because that's where the moms are they're on instagram and they're sharing on instagram. So in your case I think just having the blawg under like a shopify shop is going to be enough for you because you're you're maybe only going to be creating occasional content there couple questions yeah, I had content that I was posting on instagram how would he do that? Aside from just showing a picture that's all that I mean that's content that's all content is suren sometimes yeah and then if I were to do the shopify for the blogged I would then link that to my euro yes so you could actually just if you grab your the new you're out it would just be like the shop of eyesight would be built under that girl okay and there's this there's also a fee though if I just do the shopify blawg element right it's not free well the shop of eye sight's not free but the blogged the blood the heart of the the way you're saying I should get a shopify shop if I would be your shopping cart ok so you get rid of our shopping cart and in well let's look at your shopping cart right now actually yeah um because I think that's the other thing you know if we're looking at applying your brand elements your shopping cart to me like they're feels like a lot going on and this is built on wordpress right huh so it feels like there's a lot going on here you know you have first of all a lot of colors happening and I know you're going to streamline in that but what I have typically found in the past is that the platforms that are built for a wordpress for a shopping cart are probably not as robust as something like shopify that's actually built first and foremost is a shopping cart so it might be a chance I think just to revisit what the best shopping cart strategy is for you okay yeah, thank you sure alright, we get anything from the online audience you know they've been looking back and saying, you know, different ideas and I think people are really resonating with with how it works and we got a lot of people actually win the baby from us whilst they're really enjoying this and engaging with this and taking what they need to do for their own sides. Great. All right, so then the last area where you should be applying your brand elements to is your social media. And so the first question that comes up is should you be using social media as you or your brand? So if you have a brand name either a brand that uses, you know, engages multiple people in the case of monica your you know your business is you and your mom's so there's two people happening there then should the social media be your brand name? Should it be you? Obviously for some people this is very, very easy for me my brand is me, I'm me on social media for the most part if you are sending people from your sight and your brand is not you, your social media should also be the brand right? So if it comes back to that confusion thing, so if I am on sweet cheeks website and I click over to instagram and the answer your profile says monica and not I'm confused, right? So I would definitely be using it as the brand. Now, that doesn't mean that it can't be just you and that you can't be sort of the focus, the focal point there should be even it it something like instagram, even as a mom, not even as it should have that focus of like you is the mom. It shouldn't be like here's our corporate headquarters and then here's this, you know, it's going to be you and your life and your day, but it's going to be under the brand name, you can also consider what platforms? Because on certain platforms, people are more likely to engage with you versus a brand. So for example, I know some some people who, even though they existed or a brand name on pinterest, they actually are themselves, and that works something about that platform makes it work because you you are connecting with ah, person. He was kind of acting as a tastemaker, though, for you guys, I would certainly still be your brand name on something like pinterest um, you know, for you, sarah it's pretty easy, even though your brand name is a kind of not exactly your name, you want to be sarah whatever designs you're going to be sarah are we going with sarah shikha wait gotten that far you don't know what you mean so you're not going to use your last name because that's going to be confusing you're gonna use your brand name and then also figuring out if you're recognized as you or your or your branch there are a few people I know who built up huge falling says themselves before they launched a brand you're probably going to keep using social media as yourself then, but for the most part you're probably going to be your brand unless it absolutely makes sense for you not to be but that doesn't mean that it has to be your logo there's a lot of social media platforms were even though it might be under your brand it's still better to use your picture than a logo because that humanizes you right? I think freshly picked is a great example of that she's using social media as freshly picked but it's her picture in the loge in the image you see her you get to know her so you know that it's susan of freshly picked so I should know that it's monica from sweet cheeks or monica from living lila I should know that you are kind of the face I would say the only difference is if you really want to portray yourself as a very big not human brand then you can use your logo, but I think for most of us we want to have some kind of humanizing element, so, you know, use your picture and kind of give it that human aspect and then do your social media profiles, communicate your brands key emotions and purpose, so use this as an opportunity to go back through and look at what you're using in those profile descriptions are you giving people a sense of what the brand is and what the brand is about? You know, for cathy, you wanna communicate that you want people to get back that sense of no child like happiness and magic through glitter, you know, you want to kind of give it on that aspect, you know, you want to help them know that like, hey, like you can feel like I got this, you could feel put together, so make sure that you're communicating those aspects in your social media and this is one of those were again, you know, work through that workbook just take the time to go through all of your social media profiles and make sure they're consistent and then make sure that your social media posts are consistent so one you're posting to instagram when you're posting to facebook it should feel like the voice of your brand, it shouldn't be like if you're ran is about happiness you're not gonna go into facebook and be like the world is terrible today and I just want to hide under my covers that's inconsistent with your brand what you might say is like you know came by my whatever print and it gave me a little extra boost that I really needed today right? So maybe you're either way your day wasn't great but you want to speak in that voice of like positivity instead of the doom and gloom right? So you're in the post things like record diaper changing time like in and out of there so fast or things like that they really give you that in addition to here's my super chic person that's fit into right but on facebook you got your personal page in your professional page are you saying even on the personal page you you should be it about any single person who follows you on your personal page might buy something then absolutely yes you should I can tell you that most of the sales of mine that come from facebook come from my personal contacts and not my fan page so yes if you have a brand even that personal unless you literally go in and clear out everyone and it's just like hey it's my friends by very, very close friends and family then you could be as negative as you want or you can do whatever you want in there but I consider all of those profiles to be part of the brand that I'm building and if people know that you have this business you want to ruin that by being something completely different on facebook or like posting about your candy crush score whatever you have to think about that all of these spaces are in some way public and they are a reflection of your brand that's a great question when do I get the opportunity to make fun of my husband's playlist or like the ridiculous things that happen? Well if that makes sense for you and your brand and that's okay, okay that's what you have to figure out so that might endear you to other moms, right? So as long as you're doing it in the brand's voice that's okay, okay, what you can't say is like, I really wish I wasn't a mom I don't know what you would say that but you can't go there you can't say that even if you feel like I want to shit my kids off around the world, you can't say it like that you might be able to say like anyone else anyone want to swap kids today you could say something like that would probably come off funny great so it's not that you can't vent if it fits in your brand, but you're probably not going to say like I'm having all of these issues with, like, production it sweet cheeks like you're not going to say that. All right, yeah, so something like that is okay, so you just have to figure out what makes sense for your brand and for your brand voice. And you know what? If you're annoying to what your husband's listening to call up a friend on the phone that's e was more, yeah, making him way we feel we've gotten to this point where we feel like the only way we can communicate with people we know is through facebook way you don't have tio, you know, go get drinks with the girls, call somebody up, you know, facebook. Unfortunately, when you run a business, all of those things become part of your brand, and you have to just acknowledge that great question. So then happened you share more of your customer stories across social media, and we've been talking about this a lot, right is, you know, using those customer stories, asking your customers to use the hashtag asking them to share your products, you know, we want to do as much of that is possible because social media that's the kind of next important point is that it should be a collaboration with your customers, your web site is where you have complete and total control over what's going on you don't have complete total control of her social media somebody else owns the platform so take advantage of that and use it to have this great conversation with your customers and that makes them feel mohr invested and passionate about the brand all right, so they want everyone to share because we're gonna start thinking about creating that final strategy for our brand what areas do you think you need to apply more of your brand elements to so what's what areas are lacking in your brand elements? So monica what I mean, I know you're about to make a big shift but I mean everything I feel like I have to revamp everything now, right? I can't give you one solid e teo that's ok, cathy, I think its consistency in, you know like yeah funds everything that you said and then with the blogged and everything just being condensed into one and then also seeing if I should go for move forward with just my name or a threat the brand and I think in your case there's a lot of visual consistency so it's really just the verbal consistency everything from those names to the messaging so yeah, visual doesn't mean as much as many tweaks as all those verbal elements do for you okay, everything you're doing the total trance name my website I packaging you know, good thing I didn't go and get everything yeah, just, yeah, everything. I mean, the name that's. Huge. That is huge that's, a big shift, and we're going to talk about how to deal with all that in the next segment, for sure.

Class Description

Every small business owner shares two common goals: increasing sales and marketing more effectively. One of the most powerful ways to achieve these goals is to define and tell the story of who you are as a creator. That story is your brand, and a strong understanding of how to tell that story to your customers will take your business to new heights.

In Brand Your Creative Business, you’ll explore what makes your business a unique brand and find ways to share it. You’ll learn about implementing a brand strategy and growing and protecting it. Megan Auman will teach:

Why branding matters

How to define your brand

Storytelling to promote your business

How to develop a strategy to implement your plans

You’ll leave this course equipped and energized to create a strong, consistent presence in every aspect of your company – from packaging to customer interaction and beyond. You’ll also develop the confidence use colors, logos, and fonts to reflect your style - even if you’re not a designer

Whether you’re an Etsy seller looking to grow or an occasional crafter trying to build a full-time business, this course will give you the tools you need to connect with customers and sell more products.

a Creativelive Student

I was drawn in immediately. Megan's ability to tender precise, goal-oriented, and REAL life experience-infused information is what captivated me the most...AND...I logged in 30 minutes late on the first day of her class. I am excited to know that her course is STILL available, and on sale a couple of days after it aired live. TY CreativeLive for this opportunity; it is truly a gift to myself which will keep on giving...I have often used storytelling to build my brand, but Megan's guidance has given me a structured approach, which I really needed. Paying it forward, and sharing her amazing course with others will be a joy, as I feel an obligation to others I know, and those I have yet to know, all who will benefit from her plethora of carefully cultivated information. Her use of emotional connections to build a brand, and to reach a solid audience based on one's authentic voice is clear, clean, and easy to follow. Thank You Megan Aumen!

Visindie

This is such a great class! Great content, great advice, great examples...great, great, great!! I'm so happy that I have a clear path to create a great brand for my business. Very empowering! I especially love the bonus information, especially the video on how to make your own logo in Illustrator. Exactly the information I've been looking for. Great job, Megan!

Laura Captain Photography

I'm in the process of launching a creative business and this class was what I was looking for. With procrastination and indecision cast aside, I will now confidently plan and carry out a productive and well organized branding strategy of my own. Before this class I felt somewhat confused and overwhelmed by all the miscellaneous branding information I had been trying to piece together.
Even though I already knew some of the information she covered in the class, she put her own spin on it, gave some great examples and put it in an easy to follow plan. I particularly liked the segments related to naming your business and social media branding because I had a lot of questions on those topics.
I'm very excited to get started with branding my business and I'm so glad I took the time to go through Megan's class, it will be so worth it in the long run. A big shout out to Megan, I love your business branding, your jewelry and your teaching style, great work!